Calendar

Viva La Causa: A Teatro Retrospective

August/September 2017 | ETC Playhouse in San Juan Bautista

Back and more timely than ever, ETC’s latest collective creation transforms the ETC Playhouse into an underground auction house where EVERYTHING must go. Audiences travel from room to room as historical teatro memorabilia summon memories and excerpts of classic teatro works to highlight the cultural, political and social struggles from the past, present and future. Now booking student groups! Contact Emily Morales at emily_mmorales@outlook.com for more info.

Dia De Los Muertos

November 3-5 | ETC Playhouse | Free Outdoor Procession on Nov. 4 & 5

El Teatro Campesino Presents its 2017 Dia De Los Muertos Celebration and Procession. Our annual program kicks off on the playhouse stage with special live music and dance performances by the Folkloric dance group Esperanza del Valle. Join our Free Street Procession as we present an original musical play, beginning at our playhouse parking lot and making its way through our historic town. The weekend Celebration promises to be full of music, laughs and spiritual offerings. Don’t miss our Community Altar Exhibit featuring beautiful altars commemorating the life of loved ones passed on. To inquire about Dia De Los Muertos participation and or alter spaces please contact: gonzalezcris1987@gmail.com

La Pastorela

November 24 – December 19 | At Old Mission San Juan Bautista

This bi-annual tradition returns to Mission San Juan Bautista as ETC’s longest running tradition. “La Pastorela” is a musical retelling of the trek of the shepherds to Bethlehem to visit the Holy Child after a sign from the Angel of the Lord, but not before they find themselves beset along the way by the demonic followers of Luzbel. This pageant vibrates with stirring action, vivid color, and robust humor-all set to glorious live music and dance-throughout the mission basilica.

Past Events

Piernas: The Story Between our Legs

May 19 – June 4 | By: Cristal Gonzalez At ETC Playhouse

El Teatro Campesino proudly presents resident artist Cristal Gonzalez’ first full length play, Piernas: the story between our legs. Piernas is the story of Cecilia, a Chicana journalist on a trek back home to confront a family secret from the past. Challenges unfold as Mama’s illness takes hold on her journey to expose the truth. Shows: Thursday, Friday, Saturday 8pm & Sunday 2pm

The Sweetheart Deal

May 4 – June 4 | The Los Angeles Theatre Center

It’s 1970 and the world for Latinos is rapidly changing. With Cesar Chavez leading the largest Chicano social movement of the century, farmworkers and their families are struggling to survive. In Obie Award-winning writer/director, Diane Rodriguez’s play, THE SWEETHEART DEAL, we find the young couple Mari and Will leaving everything behind to volunteer for the United Farm Workers union working for the underground newspaper, El Malcriado. In the midst of this tumultuous moment in American history, our couple finds themselves torn between family loyalties and the demands of upholding a struggling union, asking themselves what sacrifices must they make to be the change they want to see?

Teatro Family Day Fundraiser!

Saturday, March 25, 2017 2pm-6pm | At ETC Playhouse

Join us at the El Teatro Campesino Playhouse for family fun all day! Proceeds from the day’s activities will go to support teatro educational programming in San Benito County. Activities include: face painting, film screenings of historical ETC footage, raffle prizes, costume displays, Actos performances, live music and tacos! Enter yourself into the raffle for a chance to win “Zoot Suit” memorabilia straight out of the current production in Los Angeles.

More event details coming soon!

ZOOT SUIT

February 12 – March 25 | Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles

Zoot Suit, one of the most exciting and spectacular shows ever created in Los Angeles, is set to ignite the city again. Luis Valdez is bringing his groundbreaking 1978 smash back to the Mark Taper Forum to celebrate Center Theatre Group’s 50th Anniversary.

Zoot Suit played to packed houses in L.A. for nearly a year before becoming Broadway’s first Chicano play and a major motion picture. Now, the Taper stage will once again be filled with a company of 25 mesmerizing actors, singers, and dancers weaving fact and fiction together as they portray the events surrounding the infamous 1942 Sleepy Lagoon murder. Pulsing with heart, sly wit, and an infectious musical score, featuring Lalo Guerrero’s famous songs, Zoot Suit remains a thrilling theatrical experience that animates the cultural, political, and human forces that continue to shape the City of Angels.

Palabra/ Word

February 24 – February 26 | El Teatro Campesino Playhouse

Open call for February submissions: Looking for actors, musicians, poets, spoken word artists, & visual artists to perform your work under the direction of El Teatro artists. Must be 18+ and available to rehearse Feb. 15th-Feb 25th.

LA VIRGEN DEL TEPEYAC

November 25 – December 18 | El Teatro Campesino Playhouse

Celebrating nearly four decades of tradition at the beautiful Old Mission San Juan Bautista, El Teatro Campesino (ETC) returns with its biennial spectacle of vibrant music, sacral theater, and Aztec dance. This special Christmas offering, adapted by Luis Valdez, dramatizes the four apparitions of Our lady of Guadalupe to the Indian messenger Juan Diego in 1531 in a joyous re-enactment of the miraculous events that inspired the religious rebirth of indigenous Mexico.

Box Office Opening Event

November 18, 2016 | Noon – 8pm

BUY ONE TICKET, GET ONE FREE. ONE DAY ONLY

Beginning at noon, join us for a party on The Music Center Plaza to celebrate the return of Zoot Suit to Los Angeles with activities, music, food, and special guests! Offer only available in person at the AHMANSON THEATRE BOX OFFICE on 135 N Grand Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90012

Limit 2 free tickets per person. Not valid on previously purchased tickets or combined with other offers. Handling fees may apply. Subject to availability. All sales nal.

Corridos The Remix

The Department of Television, Radio, Film and Theatre is excited to announce the opening of CORRIDOS THE REMIX: THE NEW AMERIAN MUSICAL by Luis and Kinan Valdez.

“Corridos” may be a Spanish term (for a ballad or popular narrative song), but the songs and stories in this unique fusion of music, theater, opera, mime and comedy come not just from the Latino tradition, but from African-American, Asian, Portuguese and French cultures as well.

In this revue, grandfather, Maestro, and reluctant granddaughter, Jenny, explore their newfound relationship by telling stories of many cultures.This exchange is accompanied with live music and dance.

Luis Valdez had his first play produced in 1965, while a student at San José State University.

The annual Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) celebration is a weekend-long cultural festival that commemorates and honors the lives of the departed loved ones through dance, music, offerings and art. There will be a variety of fun, family-oriented Day of the Dead activities including viewing of the Altares at El Teatro Campesino Playhouse one hour prior to performance times and two special Processions held on Saturday, November 5th at 6pm and Sunday, November 6th at 2 pm.

VIVA LA CAUSA!

June 23 – July 17 | ETC Playhouse in San Juan Bautista

Conceived as a cornerstone of El Teatro Campesino’s fiftieth anniversary season, “Viva La Causa” (Long Live the Cause) invites audiences into an immersive educational experience throughout the museum halls of the ETC Playhouse in San Juan Bautista. This year marks 35 years since ETC first converted an old packing shed into the treasured cultural institution we know today. In honor of this history, audiences will explore the various rooms and retrospective exhibits as they come to life with live and site-specific performances. Participants will be immersed in the various time periods of ETC’s fifty year history as a new local crop of enthusiastic teaching artists re-imagine the past/future, help educate, and entertain audiences of multiple generations in the classic teatro style.

LA VIRGEN DEL TEPEYAC

November 25 – December 18 | El Teatro Campesino Playhouse

Celebrating nearly four decades of tradition at the beautiful Old Mission San Juan Bautista, El Teatro Campesino (ETC) returns with its biennial spectacle of vibrant music, sacral theater, and Aztec dance. This special Christmas offering, adapted by Luis Valdez, dramatizes the four apparitions of Our lady of Guadalupe to the Indian messenger Juan Diego in 1531 in a joyous re-enactment of the miraculous events that inspired the religious rebirth of indigenous Mexico.

One of the masterpieces of the centuries-old tradition, El Teatro Campesino presents its biennial spectacle “La Pastorela” in the Old Mission San Juan Bautista. After a sign from the Angel of the Lord, the scruffy shepherds embark on their spiritual journey to visit the Holy Child, only to find themselves beset along the way by the demonic followers of Luzbel. “La Pastorela” vibrates with stirring action, vivid color, and robust humor-all set to glorious live music and dance-throughout the mission basilica. Performed in Spanish for over thirty years, “La Pastorela” reaches all audiences with El Teatro Campesino’s broad visual acting style and English librettos.

September 26 | West of Delano at the farm workers’ “Forty Acres” complex

Come be a part of history on Saturday, Sept. 26— Attend the 50th anniversary of the Delano Grape Strike Five decades ago this month a union of heroic Filipino grape workers led by Larry Itliong and Pete Velasco walked out on strike in Delano-area vineyards and asked the mostly Latino union led by Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta to join their picket lines.

The fight to maintain dignity, identity, family and love are at the heart of this American love story deeply rooted in the fertile Santa Clara Valley. Famed playwright, director and producer Luis Valdez’s sweeping epic illustrates the ironic dividebetween America’s ideals and its actions in what the San Jose Mercury News says is a “multicultural touchstone,” and of which the Los Angeles Times says “We need memory plays as powerful as this one … a quintessentially California play, written by a master of the genre.”

El Teatro Campesino brings back its unique live outdoor theater experience, “Popol Vuh: Heart of Heaven,” adapted from the sacred creation book of the Quiche Maya. This tale of the creation of the world comes to life with large-scale puppetry, captivating masks, colorful pageantry, and expressive dance as the Creator Gods make their attempts to create beings who will worship and revere them. This year ETC brings this mythical production to the city of San Francisco performing live at the Cesar Chavez Elementary School at 2pm.